I've had dozens of women friends. Some I would have placed a bet on being life timers. I was sure they were my besties. My fierce lady friends. However, I'm hard on people...I'm hard to love. This I know. My decent into self destruction, and the follow up rebuilding stage was a time in my life of pushing people away. Finding their limits, then stepping over them. I'm to blame, and I paid the biggest price in losing my best friend in Keith.

I was leery. Walls up. No one was getting in again. Not on a real level. I wasn't going to allow anyone to get to me again...no way. Friendships were defined in my world by hurt, mistrust, pain, abandonment and anger. Megan redefined this for me. It became about love, acceptance, loyalty, trust and joy.

So, why is she so special? I've asked myself this, I have an answer for it. She allowed me to be me. The hurt, the mistrust, the pain, the abandonment issues and the anger. She helped turn that into loving myself, accepting myself, fierce loyalty, trusting others and living in joy again. She doesn't bat an eye when I switch from redneck spew to hippity dippity babble. Not once has she ever told me to "get over it". She was, is, and I'm sure will continue to be the most epic friend.


She uses phrases like "We have this, I got you", "I'm not letting you go through this alone" and my most recent, personal favourite "Vandal is OURS fair and square". Somewhere along the way, what was hers became mine, and mine hers. She's the kind of friend who walks in, grabs the wine and then listens to your woes til the wee hours of the morning. She values ladies nights, fits you into her life and is always up for a rodeo adventure. She thinks about you, even when she's in the middle of her own personal hell. She stands on the earth in her bare feet with you, and gets up for 5am yoga with you. She changes the radio station before you even get in the truck. She defends fiercely, supports unwaveringly and sends me awkward selfies so I can enjoy her most uncomfortable moments!


And she sends me things like this:

This lady is everything you'd ever want in a friend, then goes the extra mile. I'm pretty sure she has faults, but they tend to go unnoticed when her strengths shine so brightly.


So if you ever get a chance to get into this girls inner circle, don't hesitate. You'll be loved, honoured, helped up, reminded of your worth and held in esteem. When you find a friend like that, you hold onto it.

Thank you, Megan...for being you, so I am free to be me.

On the one year anniversary of attending Choices, it's definitely been a journey. One I wouldn't have had the bravery to face alone, without Choices.

When we went, they asked you to take three months after G2, to make any major decisions. I did not wait. I was never patient. But I understand completely now, why they asked that. Three months was not even long enough for me to really understand a lot of the processes and tools that were presented. I stumbled and fell A LOT during those first few months. I always seem to take the long way around! A year later, I have finally taken those three months. And I finally have an answer for what Choices was, and is, to me.

It's self awareness, self acceptance and self love.

It's a common goal for humanity. It's a lifetime commitment to honesty, integrity and the path to peace. It's finding your purpose, and giving it back to others. It's understanding that habits are hard to break, but new habits can take their place...healthy habits. It's truly acknowledging that we are all human. We will all fall. But it's how we learn to fall that matters. In sports they teach us how to properly fall down, in Choices they teach us how to emotionally fall. And how to get back up without guilt, shame or regret. It's reaching out to others, and accepting a hand up. Looking to the sky, with feet planted to the ground. It's balance.

It's also hard work. And the work never stops if you're doing your job well. It's constantly asking yourself, is this who I am? Who I want to be? Then making the course adjustments to sail into your very best life. The very best version, of You. What that looks like is different for everyone, and it's accepting others just they way they are...in the exact moment of their own journey. Kindness, it doesn't cost a damn thing.

So Joe, Mary and Thelma...
Thank You seems so simple. Like not enough. You really are changing hearts, one at a time. If the whole world took Choices in school, we could start a revolution...but then again, you already have. So, Thank You for creating this program, and believing in all of Us, so we could believe in Us too.

And, just like standing up there with that microphone (which was terrifying for me)....My name is Kari, and I am a trusting woman helping others make connections. What choices gave me was, and still is, that I no longer have to justify who I am. I am enough. 💜

Today I got two messages. Both of them from different aspects of my life. But both telling me how to live it.


Now, being an adult and semi aware of the world around me, I understand that being open, vulnerable and honest...makes people cringe. It makes them uncomfortable, and often it makes them angry. When you're truly free with your life story, sometimes that doesn't sit well with the characters in your story. Gawd knows I'd be horrified to see my role in some people's lives written out for the world to see. That's why I don't mention names of the people whom have done wrong to me. With the exception of one. Because it was important to me for the world to know he is dangerous. Instead, I try to acknowledge the people who I have done wrong to. Who deserve an apology.

2016 has been that "don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out" kinda year.🚪(Bye, Felicia!) For not just me, but a lot of people. I lost tons more friends, finally got out of an emotionally abusive relationship, removed even family from my life, and struggled to make it "alone" without all these people🌌. BUT it was also the year I found myself, truly. The year I made new, flexible friends. Cut my anxiety down by about 1000 points. Don't ask me how many points there are total...all I know is I'm lighter. Freer. Happier. 🌄

I rode horses🐴 and hung out with dogs.🐶 All without the guilt and worry that I wasn't doing what I was "supposed" to be doing.🤖 I became ok with the fact that I don't miss kids, oil workers and being told who I was, wasn't good enough. Then being lured back in with fading words of a soul who was too afraid to be alone to just let me go. I'm talking about more than just a spouse, there were many of these hearts trying to "help", in all the wrong ways, for me. They didn't understand my soul is not their soul.🔮 And that's ok. Sometimes it's ok to just not understand each other.

I finally reported my abuser to the authorities,🚔 so they could do, or not do, what they felt was right. And lifted the responsibility and anger from my own shoulders. I started to move past this trauma, at my own damn pace instead of being rushed by those who just wanted me to "get over it".😒 This is my life, not theirs. I heal on my own terms, not yours.

As I look back I realize this year has been about tearing down, and rebuilding.🛠 Fixing what needed fixing. It was about plans and schedules and routines.📋 Creating better habits. Releasing my terrible reactions, and gaining control of my emotions.✌🏼️ Which was needed.

But this year, I'm going to give myself a break. I'm gonna wing it.🎉 I'm gonna stop trying to fix, and just accept. Stop trying to be normal and find the weird and wonderful.🦄 The ones who really are completely themselves. I'm tired of those who talk the talk, but never walk the walk. So if you see me walking out, it's likely because I've decided to take my own advice, and stop talking.🤐🚶

I continue to wish you all love,💜 light,✨ happiness,😃 and as always, a second round of love💞...as you navigate your own lives, in your own beautiful way. Don't ever let anyone tell you the grass is greener,🌱 cause I promise you the flowers off the path...they're blue and yellow and purple and green.💐 And they accept you, just as you are.

To a blessed 2017 💫

Do what ya gotta do-Garth Brooks
I heard this song almost a year ago, randomly on the radio after many years, and it inspired this entire blog. Now, with Garth coming back, and scoring tickets to the show...I'm finally brave enough to post the blog that has been rustling within me for a very long time...I wrote it a year ago.

"Feelings buried alive, never die."

All this talk over the years about "don't care what other people think! Be yourself!" has been a lie. At least that's what I'm being told these days. Instead I'm being told to stuff it, shut up. And most importantly keep it off social media.

It took me a few days to figure out why. It wasn't because "Facebook was an inappropriate place" to discuss my sexual violations, it was because they were embarrassed that what happened to me as a kid, under their roof, might reflect poorly on them as family. Or that someone might assume as to "who it was". The truth?

My step brother sexually violated me as a kid. There was some heated comments about word usage here.

So here's the definitions for clarifications sake (and I assure you both are accurate definitions in my case):

Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration perpetrated against a person without that person's consent.

Sexual abuse, also referred to as molestation, is forcing undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another. When that force is immediate, of short duration, or infrequent, it is called sexual assault. The offender is referred to as a sexual abuser or (often pejoratively) molester.

And I don't believe he's stopped for a second.

So, about three years ago I finally got the courage to tell the family and "out" him as the pedophile I believed him to still be.

Again, the definition for clarification is:

Pedophilia or paedophilia is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children, generally age 11 years or younger.

Psychiatric. That means they don't get better without help. They don't just stop.

So I confronted my step "brother" and his reaction was to turtle. I gave him the option of seeking help, with the family's support, or I would begin writing letters. He chose the latter. So I began writing letters to his school (yes he's a teacher) and to the local police services. All were very thankful for the information, as they would have a nice red flag if anyone else came forward about him. I also began to hear stories of at least a half dozen more he did this to, including into his adult years.

The family was initially very supportive of me. One counselling session (which the whole family except one attended) was seen as good enough. Time to sweep this under the rug. With the exceptions of my grandparents (may the universe bless them) and my biological brother, everyone else continued to have a relationship with the perpetrator without his seeking intense therapy for his disorder.

This leads us to the place where I wanted to share my trauma by expressing that I had been a victim of sexual violations also, in a random Facebook post. All hell broke loose.

How dare I? Facebook was not the place! How could I reach out to others in such a public fashion? What nerve I had to share my story. Sounds kinda stupid when you put it that way doesn't it?

In the end, I chose to take the post down with the notion that if I deleted my personal story, they must delete him from their lives until he got help. Not forever, but until he got serious, intense help.

I didn't get supported. Instead, I basically got outted from the family. I tried to tell them to get real. This was the decision? That because of a few personal words I put on Facebook I was out? But they would continue to have a relationship with a molester? It still doesn't make sense in my head. In essence, I was told to just be quiet about it. Move on.

That's victim shaming at it's finest.

Victim shaming definition:

There isn't one. So I made mine up. When people shame people who are the victims of a crime, into silence in public forums because of how others might perceive their story.

This is how I'm moving on. Thank you to the dozens of people who sent messages of "me too". And the one person, because of my story, who had the courage to face their own family member. You're all brave and worthy. Your stories are allowed to be heard for as long as you need to heal. And to connect to others because of it. Don't you dare stay silent for the sake of a few. You may help hundreds.

My family are not bad people. They are just hurt, embarrassed and unsure how to cope themselves. I love them, but for my mental health, this is important too. I know that with this story I may lose more family, maybe some friends. But if blood is thicker than water, LOVE is thicker than blood. And those who stand beside me are the warriors I want in my corner anyways.

May you all find peace and love in whatever your struggle is.